Actually Cloning your whole boot drive to another drive before doing any sort of update is better as you can boot from the clone and simply reverse clone back to the earlier OS/boot drive state. Because Time Machine drives are not boot-able, which means resorting to the OS X install disk and any update disks before restoring (time consuming and problematic). Cloning is almost entirely automated, just set it and watch TV or something, come back in a hour or so and you got your drive back.

Carbon Copy Cloner and SuperDuper are the two leading cloning software's. Make sure to "hold option boot" from the clone to check everything out (programs work and all) and repair permissions on both volumes after cloning. Filevaulted drives shouldn't be cloned.

Do a whole boot drive clone in addition to Time Machine or any other backup of files method (disk is best as it's permanent)

If you have a new drive, erase with Zero option first just to make sure to catch any bad sectors before using. Use Firewire 800 if you got it.

I'm so glad I'm waiting out the Snow Leopard beta testing out this time around.

Perhaps on a new machine...

The danger is that we sleepwalk into a world where cabals of corporations control not only the mainstream devices and the software on them, but also the entire ecosystem of online services around...

Is it a good time to jump into Snow Leopard with this update? Been holding off due to fonts/printing/Mail/MobileMe issues. Feedback from others with similar reservations appreciated.

I am using SL on a production Mac that I use daily for illustration, animation and design. I installed it about 3 weeks ago and it's been fine. I did update to the newest Adobe software at the same time so I can't speak to older versions of Adobe stuff. Epson printer drivers for my printer are still a no show, so you use the generic driver which gives you no access to cleaning ETC. That's the biggest issue. Scanner fine, laser printer fine.

That's interesting because a friend just bought a Macbook, and he has the same problem with 10.6.1, which came with the machine.

Look in sound prefs to see if internal speakers are available. If so, select it. On my friends Macbook, all that's available for output is digital output. When I plugged headphones in, it switched to that, and it worked. But when I unplugged them, all that was available again was digital output.

You do have the startup sound and some others.

This was a little weird. When I saw you said something about plugging headphones in, I tried that while looking in System Pref. > Sound. The selected "Internal Speakers" changed to "Headphones", but still no sound. Then I deselected headphones and selected it again, then the music started and worked after I unplugged the headphones again.
Looks like it was some kind of configuration that needed to be rewritten with the correct output device. But seems very odd to me anyway.

Volume is not gray for me it's just as it always is but there is no sound even if the volume is at its top.

Why? Oh why? What's your four-oh-four Apple?

(MacBook Pro 5,1 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 4GB 1067 MHz DDR3)

Solution: Go to System Preferences=>Sound=>Output and select "Internal speakers, Built-in Output". For some reasons the update switched it to "Soundflower (2ch)" which I really don't know what that is. However that's the reason why it was mute. Why did it switch? Who knows?!

Go to system preferences > sound > output and select: internal speaker (built_ in output)!
It worked for me!

Go to system preferences > sound > output and select: internal speaker (built_ in output)!
It worked for me!

Yeah I found that out after posting the message (and posted the solution in teh original post). Sorry everybody and thanks for trying to help. Strange however that the update switched the audio output... I'm glad my MBP makes some noise again. It's always making some noise and if it suddenly stops making noise it's really strange... It feel less alive \

I just updated to 10.6.2 via Software Update, and now my sound-bar item is gray and there is no sound from OS X.
If I press the volume buttons nothing happens else than the dialog with the volume is gray and a "Forbidden symbol" in the bottom.

I have a 2008 Macbook Pro (4,1).

Anyone had any problems alike, and can help me troubleshoot?

I usually experience this when I log in to two accounts at the same time. Go to System Preferences - Sound - Output (make sure it says "Internal Speakers") - Input (Make sure it says "Internal Microphone").

Actually Cloning your whole boot drive to another drive before doing any sort of update is better as you can boot from the clone and simply reverse clone back to the earlier OS/boot drive state. ...

No offence, but cloning your entire hard drive before a point update is serious overkill, especially if you have Time Machine.

True, if you want to be 100% safe that's the way to go, but the risk of anything happening that would require a complete restore is so low as to be negligible. You might as well start strapping pillows about your body in case you fall out of your chair while the update completes as well.

No offence, but cloning your entire hard drive before a point update is serious overkill, especially if you have Time Machine.

True, if you want to be 100% safe that's the way to go, but the risk of anything happening that would require a complete restore is so low as to be negligible. You might as well start strapping pillows about your body in case you fall out of your chair while the update completes as well.

Time Machine does the same thing, although it's done via incremental backups, the end result is the same.

Any time you update any system, regardless of how 'minor' it may be, you should always have a good backup. It's so easy with Time Machine, it's a shame that people don't use it more. A cheap hard drive and a $10 dollar drive enclosure and your good to go.

Yeah I found that out after posting the message (and posted the solution in teh original post). Sorry everybody and thanks for trying to help. Strange however that the update switched the audio output... I'm glad my MBP makes some noise again. It's always making some noise and if it suddenly stops making noise it's really strange... It feel less alive \

This happened to me also.

Never had an update reset the audio like that before. Actually I don't think I've ever had an update change any of my preference settings before.

I just updated to 10.6.2 via Software Update, and now my sound-bar item is gray and there is no sound from OS X.
If I press the volume buttons nothing happens else than the dialog with the volume is gray and a "Forbidden symbol" in the bottom.

I have a 2008 Macbook Pro (4,1).

Anyone had any problems alike, and can help me troubleshoot?

Yes I have a MacAir and after the update I did not have sound. Just go the system preferences/ Sound/ Outputand check the Internal Speakers.
For some reason it was going default to something called Soundflower (2ch)

Hmm should I get the straight update or the combo updater? (I'm on v10.6.1)

My instincts tell me the straight update but I vaguely remember seeing something about using the combo updater because it prevents permission issues?

The combo updater has the ability to update any Mac OS X system that is of the same family as the updater...a 10.6.2 combo updater could update both 10.6 and 10.6.1 systems where the "straight" updater assumes that you have 10.6.1 already.

I've always used the combo updaters because I've found that they work better--and I've seen strange behavior from the updaters that can only update the immediately previous release of the system.

If an earlier update's installation becomes messed up and makes your system malfunction, the combo updater goes through the motions of applying every fix and patch that has ever been released as part of a previous operating system update all the way back to the first one. That is another reason why you may want the combo updater instead.

Finally, if you ever have to recover your system by reinstalling the OS, combo updaters let you make a big jump from whatever revision your installation CD is to the current level.

Take a backup of your system using a disk cloning utility (or Time Machine if you trust it), repair permissions, download the updater, verify your disk(s) with Disk Utility, reboot once before installing it, install it, leave the computer alone while it is installing the updater and check everything out afterwards to be sure it works.

My only peeve with the 10.6.1 update was that it broke the sound preferences and changed the default output device to 'internal speakers' on every reboot. I reported this to Apple support, filled in feedback and hoped they'd work on a fix.

First thing I tried on 10.6.2, on first boot, audio defaults to 'internal speakers', so reset it correctly to 'line out' (at least that's the correct setting for me!), reboot 10.6.2 and low and behold, it doesn't work, it resets it back to 'internal speakers'.

A small, but totally un-necessary problem that should have got fixed.

This got introduced in 10.6.1, and is still there in 10.6.2.

To those who believe this was a new problem in 10.6.2, check the forums, it's not, you just got lucky last time! Also, would love to know if your temporary workarounds actually remain set after a subsequent reboot...